What counts as incomeYou and your partner can use:- income from employment before tax and National Insurance (check your P60 or payslips) - you can only use your own income if you earn it in the UK- income you earn from self-employment or as a director of a limited company in the UK - check your Self Assessment tax return- cash savings above £16,000- money from a pension- non-work income, for example from property rentals or dividends

Most of the article seems to be 'basically' correct, but not completely correct - they've got the general gist but not the actual full details.

This is the problem with all news! As soon as you read/listen/watch any news articles related to something you have any real understanding about, you begin to see that it's always wrong. Even if it's the relatively well resourced BBC. Now, expand across everything that gets covered in the news. The mind boggles at how much incorrect information is treated as fact by everybody. Best to just read a book

This is the problem with all news! As soon as you read/listen/watch any news articles related to something you have any real understanding about, you begin to see that it's always wrong. Even if it's the relatively well resourced BBC. Now, expand across everything that gets covered in the news. The mind boggles at how much incorrect information is treated as fact by everybody. Best to just read a book

So very true. The amount of air incidents recently and the tripe that is reported on them by the 'I-don't-got-no-GCSEs' reporters has enabled ample crap filter calibration for my daily news read.

With all of Meghan's official "royal duties", I'm curious to know what her current visa status is. Do any of us really believe she has go through the visa process just like anybody else? She's got to be here on some other visa type than visitor...? Has she even left the UK since they announced at the end of November?

As they will be getting married over here, if they were to do this just like any "normal" couple, she'd have to come in on a marriage visa, which she'd apply for from outside the UK. Even with priority, it's going to take several weeks to process her application. And the "Gold"* service is even longer, it seems.

Bah. Yay for the happy couple, I guess, but this pretense that they have to jump through the same hoops we all do is b%(!sh*t.

*While waiting so long for Dani's visa to come through, I began to conspiracy theorize that the whole "Gold" thing was only invented specifically for Meghan Markle, to super-fast-track her application while seemingly doing it in a way that is technically accessible to regular applicants, but they never expected regular people to use it... and that's why nobody with VFS or UKVI seemed to know what to do with it.

With all of Meghan's official "royal duties", I'm curious to know what her current visa status is. Do any of us really believe she has go through the visa process just like anybody else? She's got to be here on some other visa type than visitor...? Has she even left the UK since they announced at the end of November?

As they will be getting married over here, if they were to do this just like any "normal" couple, she'd have to come in on a marriage visa, which she'd apply for from outside the UK. Even with priority, it's going to take several weeks to process her application. And the "Gold"* service is even longer, it seems.

Bah. Yay for the happy couple, I guess, but this pretense that they have to jump through the same hoops we all do is b%(!sh*t.

*While waiting so long for Dani's visa to come through, I began to conspiracy theorize that the whole "Gold" thing was only invented specifically for Meghan Markle, to super-fast-track her application while seemingly doing it in a way that is technically accessible to regular applicants, but they never expected regular people to use it... and that's why nobody with VFS or UKVI seemed to know what to do with it.

My guess is that they took her passport and just slapped a fiancé visa in it (maybe before she entered) but without any of the waiting or worry or providing evidence or anything that the rest of us have to go through. But in that way they can claim she is not receiving special treatment.

My guess is that they took her passport and just slapped a fiancé visa in it (maybe before she entered) but without any of the waiting or worry or providing evidence or anything that the rest of us have to go through. But in that way they can claim she is not receiving special treatment.

I assume so, too. And that's fine if they did just give her the visa... what do I care if the royal family is above the law? But don't pretend like she has to go through the hoops to the media/public if she doesn't! They shouldn't be allowed to trivialize what we all have/had to do to be with our partners.

I assume so, too. And that's fine if they did just give her the visa... what do I care if the royal family is above the law? But don't pretend like she has to go through the hoops to the media/public if she doesn't! They shouldn't be allowed to trivialize what we all have/had to do to be with our partners.

I also agree. We know perfectly well that she will not be under the same scrutiny, and definitely has already skipped a hoop or five. Whatever - don't imply that it's that easy for the rest of us, because it definitely is not.

Logged

Married December 1992 (my 'old flame' whom I first met in the mid-70s)1st move to UK - 1993 (Letter of Consent granted at British Embassy in Washington DC)ILR - 1994 (1 year later - no fee way back then!)Back to US in 2000Returned to UK July 2011 (Spousal Visa/KOL endorsement)ILR - September 2011Application for naturalization submitted July 2014Approval received 15-10-14; ceremony scheduled for 10 November!Passport arrived 25 November 2014. Finally done!